Liked the mike too. The interior looks neat and spacious until you remember the power of wide angle lenses. The Ars Technica author commented on how crowded it would be with a full crew (but in zero G for 6 hours, not a big deal.)

Yep, all of the prospective commercial crew vehicles will get quite packed with a crew of seven. I have attached an image which shows how 7 would be seated: (top row of 3, then 4 below their feet) The wider diameter of the CST-100 compared to Dragon allows this kind of seating, whereas the Dragon cabin compensates by being taller, thus two levels. (bottom image)

Both seating arrangements have their pros/cons, so it will be interesting to see more final/complete mockups with all seats in place to judge how much space there is left.

Interior volume won't be a big issue with a day one docking:

Quote

Boeing is planning a flight day one rendezvous and docking capability with the space station, rather than the shuttle’s day-three berthing.

"We're going to dock within 24 hours on a normal mission and six hours after undock, we are going to be on the ground... If everything goes well, you're not going to be a passenger in this vehicle in flight for more than 18 hours."

It probably has more room than SpaceX's capsule because it doesn't contain self-contained boosters like the Dragon....which I assume take some room...

They may not take up any room at all inside the pressurized cabin. The boosters/thrusters will share propellant with the regular Draco thrusters, and the thruster pods are located on the outside of the pressurized cabin - if the recent mock ups are accurate.

Is there anywhere more information about the SIMAC docking system? Tried searching the site and googling, no pdfs no diagrams no images of mockups, nothing.

There's not even anything on L2. I don't get why it seems like there's an embargo on SIMAC info.

Intellectual property (Boeing) / ITAR issues?

Aviation Week called it a "non-proprietary system" and stated it's supposed to be part of an international docking standard. Prior to SIMAC NASA published a plethora of knowledge on the NDS (they even let you download some STL files of it), so I'm not sure why ITAR would now prevent them now from posting some basic info.

I've recently contacted the International Docking Standard website and NASA PAO to see if I could get any info on the project, I'll post an update when they email back.

« Last Edit: 07/25/2013 03:01 pm by manboy »

Logged

"Cheese has been sent into space before. But the same cheese has never been sent into space twice." - StephenB

HOUSTON, July 24, 2013 – Two NASA astronauts evaluated communications, ergonomics and crew-interface aspects of the Boeing [NYSE: BA] Crew Space Transportation-100 capsule on July 22, showing how future astronauts will operate in the spacecraft as it transports them to the International Space Station and other low Earth orbit destinations.

In this photo, astronaut Serena Aunon prepares to enter the CST-100 mockup for flight-suit evaluations.

I assume the "Mission" is to transport the passengers on the CST-100 to their destination safely. If the passengers do not arrive at the destination safe and sound, then the mission is a failure.

What did the Boeing employees think the mission was ?

That.. what you're missing is that Alex Diaz didn't say that. He said safety is the top priority, in which case you can easily achieve that by just not flying anyone. That's what makes it an incredibly stupid statement and yet people keep making it.

Published on Jul 31, 2013The Boeing Company evaluated tools, equipment and procedures it could use if the CST-100 spacecraft is required to make a water landing. The testing included a full-scale mockup of the spacecraft floating in a specialized facility operated by Bigelow Aerospace near Las Vegas. The CST-100 is one of three spacecraft under development in partnership with NASA's Commercial Crew Program. The others are the SpaceX Dragon and Sierra Nevada Corporation Dream Chaser.